


lighten up, you

by softestbreads



Category: Fire Emblem Heroes, Fire Emblem: Soen no Kiseki/Akatsuki no Megami | Fire Emblem Path of Radiance/Radiant Dawn
Genre: Fluff, Light Angst, Other, and you just want zelgius to be happy, it's new years
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-20
Updated: 2019-02-20
Packaged: 2019-11-01 08:45:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,488
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17864147
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/softestbreads/pseuds/softestbreads
Summary: there was always an apparent frown on zelgius' face, and you were never really sure on why. it's when a smack of mochi hits you across the face you finally realized.





	lighten up, you

**Author's Note:**

> a small little request i got on my blog, @thisway-imagines. i hope you enjoy uwu!

Zelgius, the Black Knight, the still general of Begnion, the man who held a mysterious aura around him constantly…

…did he ever lighten up, honestly?

You sighed heavily, for it had been months since he had been summoned here and yet Zelgius was incredibly stiff and unsure of his surroundings no matter how much you tried to welcome him into Askr - the general was too weary and too suspicious of people in here, especially with the likes of the Tellius soldiers around (Zelgius was especially wary of the Ikes that wandered around the castle, always looking at them with a glimpse of sorrow in his eyes). As the summoner, you felt like you were in charge of settling people down into Askr - you personally understood the feeling of unease and fear upon arriving in such a new place with new responsibilities and war to fight in. It was incredibly tough, and missing home was always a constant feeling tugging against your body lightly.

But with Zelgius, you couldn’t read what he was feeling. You knew that it wasn’t always your own responsibility to be shoving yourself in others’ personal affairs, but it was heartbreaking for you to see Zelgius sitting all alone in the mess hall, the forlorn look in eyes ever-present since the day he arrived in your summoning hall in such a pitiful state (he was so injured, so terribly injured and wounded like a small animal despite his physique), the cold way he conducts himself within the castle… you just wanted to make him feel welcome to Askr, where many come from different unique backgrounds and won’t discriminate him the way he was treated back in his home. Askr’s vast libraries gave you access to the many histories of the continents that existed outside of its own, and the books were discriminatory and criticized Zelgius’ actions heavily - and it made your heart sunk when Zelgius stumbled upon your summoning stone one day in such a pitiful state. From the day you summoned him, you were sure that he wasn’t the person those books told you he was - the pain he held in his eyes told you so on that day.

There was a massive effort for you to try and befriend him - you would sit next to him and converse with him little by little as if not to overwhelm him, but to show that you only wanted to befriend him. He was a shy man outside of his cold exterior, shown through his stumbling and quiet tone he held with you - and whenever he did have a problem, Zelgius would come to consult you for any opinions. Great progress was created between you two, but…

He never really smiled - even around you.

_Hah, and you really thought he was starting to trust you, huh?_

You shook away your thoughts. People don’t have to smile to show that they trust you! Zelgius is probably the closest to you out of all the other heroes, and…

_But is he really enjoying his stay here? He still looks miserable as ever._

You sighed again. What _can_ you do?

As you continued to fiddle with the pen and the map in front of you, your thoughts drifted to the events that happened and were happening. You remember trying to get Zelgius to give candy out to the children, but his glare had intimidated everyone so much they refused to go near him. For Christmas, it had been significantly more successful with him as Santa with a silly ‘ol beard slapped onto his face and the big Santa hat placed over his head - this time, children flocked to him like hordes. While you found it incredibly amusing as it was smooth sail, you immediately panicked when you found out Zelgius had passed out on the spot as more children clambered on him and poked him; you had to spend a lot of time apologizing to him afterward.

Now, New Years was just around the corner - chatters of the new year were heard often in the castle as you patrolled around, there were heroes running around with various decorations in preparation for it, the New Year heroes having forming a small clique amongst each other about the traditions and so on. The energy within the hallways was bustling nowadays - but your head was filled with worries over the war and Zelgius himself. Of course, it was the time to celebrate a nice tradition and forget about the war temporarily - but yet, you couldn’t help but feel that feeling of worry tugging against you against.

_It was just like that feeling when you first arrived here. Gods, you were starting to feel the anxiety pull against you again with all of these responsibilities being thrown against you into such a sudden situation again, and-_

_**Smack!** _

“Ow!”

You rubbed your cheek lightly, for that hit against your face was hard. You were slightly annoyed at the sudden projectile that was thrown directly at your face - turning around immediately to see the perpetrator, you saw Takumi there with his mochis as Fjorm and Azura tried to suppress their giggles.

Stomping to their side while continuing to rub your poor cheek, you asked: “Hey! What gives?” as they grinned and snickered, eventually evolving into full-blown laughs at your expense. Frowning, you asked again: “Why did you do that, Takumi?! That hurt!”

Hearing your annoyed tone, Takumi hushed his laughter down. “Oh, sorry - I probably threw that a bit too hard,” he apologized genuinely as he scratched his chin. But then he shook his head, and looked at you in the eyes. “You always seem so deep in thought, [Name]. Shouldn’t you… lighten up a bit?”

_Lighten up a bit?_

“Ah-?”

_Were you the one who needed to lighten up a bit as well?_

Azura laughed again at your stumped expression. “There you go again, [Name]. Always so lost in your own thoughts,” her laugh was like bells, “I understand the war is tough and it feels like we ever hardly get a break.” As the songstress ended her sentence, Fjorm walked up to you and took hold of your hand and held it between her two hands. “Why don’t you relax a little bit with us? You hardly to ever seem to catch a break… and throwing mochi is fun, isn’t it, Prince Takumi?”

The Hoshidan Prince let out a quiet “sheesh”, but smiled nonetheless. “It is nice to get out of my princely attitudes once in a while, yes,” There was a shyness in his face for he was embarrassed for not acting like the supposed Prince of Hoshido that he was - but it soon went away as quickly as it appeared. “But hey, since it’s my time off here, why not have fun? And you can throw this time, [Name] - since I obviously throw too hard.”

You let out a small bark of laugh, looking slightly nervous to be shirking your patrolling duties. “I mean, I…”

“Just for a while?” Fjorm urged, her smile infectious as you bit down your own grin that bubbled up on your lips.

And then a wicked idea came past your mind as flashes of a certain general suddenly appeared in your vision…

“I’m in.”

* * *

 

It was a lot more fun than you expected it to be.

Snickering around the castle with the trio as you stayed hidden away from most heroes’ vision, you relished in their surprised reactions when a small treat was thrown at them (Gaius immediately took notice of you all, and joined in to snack and throw mochi at people as well) - it was funny to see them so bewildered and stunned to where it came from (and you imagined that was how you looked before you noticed Takumi was the culprit of it all, and thought fondly of it as well).As you continued to hunt around the castle for your next victims, your eyes shone brightly when you saw Zelgius wandering around the gardens by himself. “Guys, that’s him! I’ve been trying to find him for ages now!” You smiled at your friends, as they returned your smile with their own grins. “What’s the plan, Summoner?” Gaius inquired as he chewed on another mochi, with Takumi slapping his hand away from his stash and grumbling quietly when the thief smirked to himself. You sighed in exasperation, but you couldn’t remove the grin off your face.

“Okay, here’s the plan…”

_Bonk._

Zelgius looked down to see a mochi on the floor.

What in the heavens is going on?

As he leaned down to pick up the offending object, he felt another small _bonk_ against his armor once again. Turning around sharply to see what it was, it was another mochi that seemed to have been thrown from nowhere.

“Wha-”

Then another one against his leg.

Zelgius turned his head up sharply when he heard the shuffling of a tree nearby him, coming up to inspect it immediately. Who was playing this game with him? Was it an enemy wanting to trick him, perhaps? As he approached the tree, he let out a small “oof” as one hit him square against his head.Were… were there multiple enemies who wished to play around with him?

“Damn, then I have to warn the Summoner…!” Zelgius said under his breath, but then had another piece of mochi thrown at him on his cheek. As he heard the snicker of someone in another tree, he immediately started to head towards it.

Suddenly, you felt yourself become cold. 

He was heading towards _you._

As you looked around at the other trees, the 4 others become dead silent and motioned you not to move, when-

Zelgius started to shake your tree violently. You started to become unbalanced on the tree branches, letting sounds of _“woah, woah, woah!”_ as you clung onto the tree desperately for leverage - the general was cursing you under his breath, not knowing that you were the perpetrator of this all: “How dare you, you assassin, to come here and ought to mock me like this-!”

You lost grip of the branch as you tried holding onto the mochi as well, and took a tumble off when the shaking became harder-

“Ah!”

“[Name]?!”

You fell unceremoniously off the tree with all your mochis falling off from your grasp, closing your eyes as you expected to hit the floor.

But the impact never came, as you felt yourself being pulled flush against Zelgius entirely. As he looked at you wide-eyed, you mirrored his look for a brief moment until…

“Hehe… surprise?”

You felt Zelgius relax significantly as his shoulders lost their tension and he let out a large sigh. “Are you alright, [Name]? I’m glad to see you not at harm.”Now realizing that he was just worried for you, you suddenly felt a little guilty. “I-I’m fine, thanks to you…” 

He nodded in relief as he set you down, then suddenly became red at what he just did. _He just held you into his arms._ As he became nervous under your stare, Zelgius didn’t seem to know what to say anymore when he folded his arms stiffly against himself - meanwhile, you felt guilty for placing him under such a situation because you thought he could have fun, but… he looked so stressed.

“I-”

“Wh-”

You both started to talk, but then immediately shut up after you cut each other out. “No please, Zelgius - go first!” You urged, but then he replies back: “No, it’s fine. You should have the first say…” And then both of you went silent again.You sighed again for what was the nth time that day.

“Look… I’m sorry, Zelgius. I’m sorry for scaring and teasing you like that, by throwing all of those mochis…” You scratched the back of your head, looking down sheepishly. “It’s just… I don’t know if you’re happy here.”

Zelgius felt himself inhaling sharply.

“You always look so downcast and I… I don’t know what to do. I just want you to know that I’m here for you and we’re all accepting of people… and that includes you too! I just…” you trailed off, finding the words hard to convey at the moment.

“… I just want you to be happy.”

Immediately, he spoke up as he took a step towards you and held onto your hand gently.

“Is this why you threw mochi at me? To make me… feel happy?”

You laughed awkwardly. “I mean… when you put it that way…”

There was a moment of silence between you two, as the guilt started to seep into you even more as the silence prolonged further; you were ready to start leaving, for you knew everything you did was _ridiculous anyway, why did you even decide to do this-_

“… I am happy here.”

You snapped out of your train of thoughts and looked up to him with genuine surprise.

There was a flush in Zelgius’ face again, this time darker under your shocked look. “It’s… hard to convey my emotions. I’ve repressed them for so long now it’s… become something I do.” He looked away from your eyes out of shyness, but continued: “But I am… so much happier to be here.”

And it took him all his willpower to look into your glistening, shining eyes again.

“And I seem… to be the happiest when I’m around you.”

Suddenly, he felt your arms come up to wrap around his neck when you jumped up, with him immediately catching you and pulling your hips flush against him as a gut-instinct - there was pure joy radiating off your laughter as you looked at him as Zelgius twirled you around the gardens out of surprise.

And there it finally was - the smile you had been looking from him for these many months.

“You’re… you’re smiling!” You exclaimed as he spun you around happily. “I’m… I’m so glad!” You laughed even more as you pulled him into a closer hug, both of you now laughing until the dizziness started to overcome you.

As he placed you down, Zelgius questioned your dizzy self with a smaller smile on his face this time: “Smiled? You wished to see me smile all this time?”

“Uh…” Now you were the one to feel shy. “Y-yes…”

He thought of all the times he smiled when around you as you stood there, shy in front of him - he smiled when he was in his bedroom the first night he stayed in Askr after your warm hospitality, he smiled when you were so childishly excited about all the candy you were gonna give out as you rambled on animatedly, he smiled when he saw you apologizing profusely for such a minor problem…

Had you never realize?

“I suppose I should smile more for you often, I take it?”

You flushed, and nudged his arm lightly. “When you’re happy, of course.”

“I always am, now that I’m with you.”


End file.
